The harnessing of processing power by the modern-day writer, the linking of the brain with the computer, has created conditions in which literary works can be created that the greats could only dream of.

The skill of the writer is to create imagery, vivid sharp solid imagery, people that walk across space, moving from one clear background to another. The people need not be so sharply defined, the writer has to allow the reader to render the characters according to their own imaginations. There needs to simply be guidance to encourage that fertile process.

Flowery effervescence and intricacies that describe people and backgrounds to the nth degree are from a bygone age, before the modern mediums of TV and film existed. The reader cried out for detail, they wanted their imaginations to be used to delineate the tortoiseshell button from the teak, the hydrangea from the frangipani, the greyness of the slate roof was a concern to them. Those readers lived in the Golden Age of novels, when imaginations were the only means of exciting the brain with imagery that could not be viewed through the eye. Their time devoted to the books was great, there was nothing else to distract them from the world that is created by the writer, that comes to realisation and is embellished by each individual according to their own uniqueness.

The great writers were possessed with brilliance that enabled them to fabricate their worlds relying purely upon powerful memories that held the whole novel in their grasp. Theirs was truly the all-seeing eye. The words were placed onto paper by the writer by quills dipped into inks made from solutions of iron salts and tannic acid. There was little room for error, freedom of expression had to take place within the closely defined boundaries of the plot. Any process of editing was fraught with physical difficulty, scissors and glue, the cut and paste of the computer, were the means by which the novel would be rejigged and characters literally cut from the womb that spawned them.

Without fearsome memories and incredible intellect there could be no Dickens, Dostoevsky or Dumas. Lesser beings fell by the wayside leaving the greats to power on, creating worlds and exploring the furthest reaches of space, fighting with extinct creatures and nurturing the tenderest feelings of love and affection. The readers sat enthralled, reading by gas-light then the electric lamp. What would those writers have achieved linking the power of their omnipotent minds to that of the computer? The restrictions created by the physicality of the writing process are eliminated. Story becomes all, plot is a necessary but not an all-important requirement. The modern-day writer can leave behind the safety and security of plot and venture into their own imaginations, producing works that the geniuses of old could barely match. Errors can be eliminated with a few quick key strokes. The story becomes all, as imagination is given free rein, characters are able to develop with a lack of detail that would have been unthinkable to the Victorian or Edwardian, the backgrounds are as finite or infinite as the writer deems necessary. The computer, linked to the brain, is capable of producing works that the greats could only dream of.